Sinner's Heart

Chapter 14

Bram lunged the same time that one of the giant rats leapt forward. He aimed for the creature’s heart, but it dodged his strike, and his sword plunged into the creature’s shoulder. It squealed in rage and pain. He pulled out his blade and jumped aside, narrowly missing its whipping tail.

A second rat attacked, fangs first. He vaulted backward before it could tear a chunk out of his leg.

Glancing over at Livia, he saw her backing slowly away from the third beast, as the rat growled in its advance. Though she held her hands up, no glow of magic encircled them. She’d always been quick to summon her power.

“Use your magic,” he shouted.

“I cannot,” she yelled back. “I am still not strong enough.”

“Damn it,” he growled. She had no way of defending herself. Not even a mortal weapon.

He sprinted toward Livia, determined to protect her. But the two other monstrous rats blocked him. Both creatures attacked, keeping him from coming to her aid. He leapt and dodged, striking the beasts wherever he could. The damned things took far more damage than any normal animal might, their black fur glistening with patches of blood drawn by his blade.

One dragged a claw across his thigh, and pain followed in a burning line. He hardly noticed. He had to kill these things and get to Livia, safeguard her.

Peach silk flashed in the corner of his eye.

“Don’t run!” he shouted. Running meant turning one’s back, inviting attack. But she didn’t listen. She ran straight toward the couch.

As he held back two rats, he saw her tearing off the blanket. She put the couch between herself and the creature stalking her, twisting the blanket into a rope as she did so. The beast clambered up onto the couch, its lips curled in a snarl, the fur on its back raised up in spikes.

It would tear her apart.

To his shock, she didn’t run. Instead, she allowed the rat to attack, and shoved the twisted blanket into its mouth. The beast choked on the fabric. Its flaming tongue set the blanket alight. Fire spread quickly along the clot. The creature couldn’t drop the blanket in time before flames jumped onto its fur. In seconds the monster was engulfed. It careened around the interior of the warehouse, shrieking, then collapsed in a heap of charred fur.

As one of the rats made another feint at Bram, he slammed his foot down on its muzzle, pinning its head to the floor. He stabbed the beast directly behind its left shoulder, skewering its heart. It shuddered then stilled, blood spreading across the ground.

The second rat lunged, and Bram kicked it so the thing flew back. It collided with the desk. He darted forward and attacked, thrusting his blade between the creature’s ribs. He pushed hard, until the sword’s tip hit the wood of the desk. The beast squealed, thrashing and scraping at the air with its claws. He wouldn’t relent. Not until it went motionless, and the glow of its eyes dimmed, bereft of life.

He pulled his blade free and turned back to help Livia.

She stood beside the couch, her hands on her knees, gasping for breath. The rat still had the blanket twisted around its neck, but it splayed upon the couch. Dead.

He strode to her. “No magic, no weapons, and still you find a way.”

“I’ve never cared for being powerless.” She straightened and glanced at the trio of dead monsters. “The Dark One will send more.”

“Then we make sure he doesn’t find us.” He ran a hand along her shoulder, down her arm, a quick confirmation that she was sound.

“Where can we go? It must be someplace John doesn’t know of.”

He gathered up their few belongings. “There’s never a shortage of hiding places in London.”

Bram and Livia rode his horse beside the river, past ships at anchor and smaller boats tied to piers. The river embankment was heavily shadowed, and the figures picking their way along the muddy shore seemed distant, lost recollections. Fog crept up from the water, heavy and dank. A girl passed by, selling oyster pies, and Bram purchased two, which Livia and Bram bolted as they walked. A few hoarse and muttering watermen lingered nearby, stamping their feet and complaining of the lack of business, but otherwise there was only tense suspension.

They moved away from the river, into an old and crumbling part of town.

“Here,” he said, nodding toward a tavern. A sign swinging from its shingle announced, BEDS BY THE HOUR OR FOR THE NIGHT.

She eyed the tavern dubiously, and well she might. The two-story structure looked as though it had been built in the time of Henry VIII, and no repairs or maintenance had been done since the reign of Elizabeth. What windows weren’t broken were coated in grime.

Yet Livia seemed to understand that this was the kind of place John would never look, and, as such, was far safer than one of the more elegant inns. So, after Bram paid a boy to tend to his horse, she followed him inside.

Half a dozen men cradled tankards as they sat in chairs and settles, and suspicion glinted in their eyes when Bram and Livia entered. More than suspicion shone in their gazes when they looked at Livia. Bram stepped so that he stood in front of her, blocking her from their leers.

“What do you want?” a haggard woman in an apron asked.

“A room for the night.” Bram coarsened his accent. An aristocrat in Whitechapel would only attract unwanted attention. “Got to have a lock on the door.”

One of the patrons stood and swaggered over. Gin seemed to ooze from his pores. A knife with a worn handle was tucked into the waistband of his breeches. Puffing out his chest, he sneered, “Don’t talk like a nob, but you dress like one, an’ got a sword like them fancy gents, too. Maybe you is a nob, and you got a nice fat purse with you.”

Bram met his gaze without blinking. “Try taking it. You’ll wind up as dead as the toff I stole this gear from.” His grip tightened on the pommel of his sword.

The gin-soaked man blanched. He scuttled back to his seat and paid particular attention to the bottom of his tankard.

“No trouble,” the tavern keeper said sharply.

“Don’t want trouble,” Bram answered. “Just a room.”

The woman led him and Livia up the rickety stairs, then unlocked a room at the end of a hallway. He peered inside. The room held minimal furnishings, and the walls were bowed with age, but the bed appeared clean, at least. He held out his hand, until the tavern keeper relented and gave him the key.

She stepped out into the hallway. “Food’s extra.”

“We won’t be eating.” He shut the door in her face, then locked it. Turning back, he faced Livia, who stood in the middle of the room wearing a wry expression.

“From an abandoned house to a dockside warehouse to a dilapidated inn,” she murmured. “No woman has ever been so overindulged.”

“I’d take you to a goddamn palace if I could.” He glowered at the warped floorboards.

She crossed to him and cupped a hand to his cheek. “There are no palaces for fugitives.”

He leaned into her touch. Even in this shabby place, his need for her roused easily. But he could not give in to that need when peril loomed close on every side.

By force of will, he turned away. “We’ll abide here. The other Hellraisers are making their way back to London, and you need to regain your strength.”

She scowled. “Curse this helplessness . . .”

“Not so helpless. You did manage to kill a giant demonic rat.”

She waved her hand in dismissal. “One creature is nothing. We’ll face far more than that in the coming battle.”

The small window looked out onto the street, but hardly anyone was out. “In the Colonies, we had scouts keeping watch on the French. They’d warn us in advance of hostile action. What I wouldn’t give for those Rangers now.”

“Spiders use their webs much the same,” she said, thoughtful.

He turned and leaned against the wall. “As we’ve neither Rangers nor giant spiders, we’re at a disadvantage.”

“Perhaps not.” She studied her hands. “I can spin a web of magic, cast it over the city. Should John or the Dark One disturb the web, I’ll know.”

He moved to her and took her hands in his, palms upward. “You were unable to use magic against the creatures in the warehouse.”

Bands of angry color stained her cheeks. He realized too late that she didn’t like being reminded of her perceived shortcomings. “Summoning the Hellraisers taxed my power.” Her words turned husky. “But I know of a way to replenish my strength.”

His breath caught as she grasped his hands and walked backward toward the bed.

“Ancient and powerful, this magic,” she continued, her eyes growing heavy-lidded. “The first acts of creation were the joining of male and female.”

“Tempting,” he rasped. “So bloody tempting. But we’ll be vulnerable.”

She shook her head. “It makes us stronger.”

Brutal hunger gripped him, knowing now what it could be like between them. “Then let us be strong.” He kissed her with a need as fierce as madness.

Light threw bands of watery sun through gaps in the walls upon the floor as Livia and Bram made love. The need they had for each other couldn’t be sated, and the day’s tension sharpened their desire rather than dulled it. Her power responded to his nearness, drawing strength from him, from the passion they created. Together, they were unleashed, fearless.

They each possessed a wealth of experience, and neither could begrudge the other’s past profligacy when it meant hour upon hour of pleasure, of strength.

Livia felt herself borne upon waves of sensation, every part of her learning every part of Bram. Were she not half so worldly, she might have blushed at their activity. Yet she was no girl, but a woman grown, and felt no shame when she beheld the red markings she left on Bram’s back, his buttocks, the indentation of her teeth upon his neck.

He marked her, too. In every way. On and within her. They took turns having each other, and sometimes it was a battle to see who would win. He was indefatigable, bold, sly, inventive. And he devoured her demonstrations of power. He stretched out across the bed and she used him as she pleased while he rasped rough words of encouragement.

With each touch, each moan of pleasure and shivered response, she felt her magic strengthen, as though feeding kindling to a fire. She’d previously used sex to create power—yet she’d never had a lover like Bram before. Not merely his experience, but the bond they shared. His caresses held more import than merely the sensation of flesh to flesh.

They took and gave with equal measure, her magic growing more potent. It fair glowed around her like a corona. He saw this, and it seemed to stimulate him further, his gaze and hands and mouth devouring her.

The web of magic spun out from her with each touch and release. She felt herself at the center of an invisible yet gleaming net, attuned to everything.

“I can feel it,” he murmured against her damp skin. “The web. How it grows. You’ve done it.”

“We have,” she answered, “but it isn’t strong enough.” Then she took him in her mouth, and he stopped speaking.

Later, she pressed a hand to his chest, holding him back when he moved to cover her with his body once more. “Power is a delicate thing. Too much, and we risk collapse.”

“But what a spectacular collapse,” he said, lying back with one arm flung above his head. He stroked her bared flesh with his other hand, and she had to smile at the self-satisfaction on his face. Here was a man who had not only ravished her, but who had been ravished in return.

She allowed herself a momentary fantasy—that she and Bram could spend their days and nights in just this way, discovering new and favored ways to give each other pleasure, that they had no concerns save for sleeping and occasionally eating, that this shabby room served as the demarcation of their world and nothing else existed beyond it. Not the Dark One. Not John. Not the looming war.

Yet, as she and Bram entwined, drowsing and sated, it came upon her suddenly, and she sat up, gasping.

“What is it?” Bram was instantly alert, all traces of languid satisfaction gone.

Her brow lowered. “I can feel him. The web shudders.”

“The Devil.”

“John.” She closed her eyes, homing in on his presence. “He’s using a transporting spell. The beginning and ending of the passage are marked. I feel him working to bore through.”

Bram was already standing. “You can take us to where he’ll transport himself.”

She nodded. Though the remaining Hellraisers had not yet returned, if John was using new, dangerous magic, something had changed, the balance tipping. “If I were to attempt the same spell, John could find us as well.”

“Horseback it is.”

As she and Bram struggled into their clothing, she took in the details of their room, from the streaked windows to the single chair in the corner. This was no dream palace of silk and gold, built for loving. And yet she would clutch these memories close.

They hurried downstairs. None of the patrons remained, and the woman who kept the tavern scurried out.

“You said you’d take the room for the whole night,” she complained.

Bram said nothing, only tossed her a coin. The woman’s mouth clapped shut and her eyes widened when she beheld the coin’s denomination.

Outside, they mounted Bram’s horse, with Livia sitting behind Bram, her arms wrapped around him. She concentrated on the strain in the web. “Head west.”

Bram kicked his horse into a canter, and they pushed deeper into the city as night fell. Livia was not sorry to leave behind the tavern and ramshackle buildings.

As she and Bram wove through the city, some of the windows they passed were illuminated, candles and lamps lit as early darkness descended and people attempted to conduct their lives with a semblance of normalcy. Others remained dim, shapes and shadows moving within. A bitter wind scoured the streets.

She guided Bram through sense, feeling the pull of John’s magic on the web she’d spun. Until they stopped outside a large home.

“This is Walcote’s place.” Bram dismounted and helped Livia down.

“A dangerous man, this Walcote?”

“A Parliamentarian. One of Maxwell’s set.”

They hurried up the steps. Before Bram could pound his fist on the door, it opened, revealing a servant.

“My lord, madam,” he said with a bow. “Alas, my master is not at home to visitors.”

Bram shouldered past the servant. “He’ll see us. Where is he? Is he by himself?”

The servant opened his mouth to object, but a single glance from Bram stopped his protestations. “My master attends to matters of business in the Green Drawing Room. Alone.”

No relief there. John could easily appear without the servant knowing.

“Take us to him,” Livia said.

Without another word, the servant led her and Bram down a corridor, and paused outside a tall, carved door. The servant paused to tap on the door, but Bram had already opened it and strode inside.

A man of middle age sat at a table, sifting through stacks of paper. He stood, frowning, when Bram and Livia entered the chamber.

John was nowhere to be seen.

“I wasn’t to be disturbed by anyone,” Walcote snapped at the servant. He glared at his visitors. “What is this about?”

“Your life is in jeopardy,” Livia said.

Walcote approached. “In the name of God? Who threatens me?”

“John Godfrey.” Bram paced through the chamber, studying the corners, peering behind curtains. He was a commanding presence in the room, radiating purpose.

Walcote laughed. “Godfrey? He’s no threat. The past ugliness of assassins and schemes is over. As of today, John Godfrey has been ousted from Parliament.”

Livia’s heart stuttered, and Bram swore under his breath.

Walcote glanced back and forth between them, clearly anticipating a more enthusiastic response to his intelligence. “We’ve nothing to fear from him now.”

“You bloody idiot,” Bram growled. “Now you’ve everything to fear.”

Livia neared Bram and spoke lowly. “He won’t be held back anymore. Not by the rules of your government or society.” John was free, the chain around his neck loosed.

“You need to flee this place,” Bram said to Walcote.

“The man is a pariah,” Walcote protested. “He has no friends, no allies.”

“He has a very powerful ally,” said Livia

Walcote smirked. “Not in London, he doesn’t. Do I know you, madam?”

“London is not the final word in power,” Bram said darkly.

“John Godfrey can do nothing,” responded Walcote. “He is stripped of authority. He—”

“Is here,” said a muffled voice from the doorway.

Everyone turned to see a lanky figure standing at the entrance to the chamber. Only through his voice did Livia recognize John, for he wore a broad-brimmed hat pulled down, and a scarf obscured the lower half of his face. Leather gloves covered his hands. Save for a narrow band around his eyes, his skin was entirely concealed.

The servant who had let Livia and the others into the house now slumped at John’s feet, unconscious. Blood seeped from a wound on the servant’s head. Though John carried no mortal weapon, Livia saw the energy crackling around him in a dark nimbus, the lingering traces of having used magic to hurt the footman. She murmured a shielding incantation, yet left off the final words—keeping her own magic ready for whatever should happen next.

“Godfrey,” Walcote exclaimed. “What in God’s name?”

“Not God’s name.” John stepped over the prostrate servant, his gaze locked on Bram.

The two men faced each other, both alert, wary. Bram was tense as an arrow, confronting his erstwhile friend. He drew his sword.

The lines of battle were drawn, Bram on one side, John standing on the other.

“This is how friendship is rewarded?” John spat. “With basest treachery?”

“You know nothing of friendship,” Bram said. “Nothing of loyalty or honor.”

The scarf around John’s mouth could not stifle his harsh laugh. “Abraham Stirling, Baron Rothwell speaking of honor. Next, I’ll hear a woman talk of learning.” His gaze turned to Livia, and she tensed. “And here is the Roman slut who challenges me.”

She held Bram back with a warning glare, though he plainly wanted to ram his fist in John’s face.

“Who will defeat you,” she answered.

“No longer a ghost, madam? That makes it all the easier to destroy you. I shall delight in that. Never killed a woman before.”

This time, Livia could not restrain Bram. He feinted with his sword, and John dodged the blow. But as John reacted, Bram’s other fist collided with John’s jaw. John staggered back. As he did, his hat tumbled off, and his scarf slipped, revealing his face.

She pressed her hand to her mouth, whilst Bram cursed and Walcote gasped.

The markings of flame covered John’s face. Across his cheeks and forehead, surrounding his eyes. He was entirely enveloped in the Dark One’s mark, with only his burning eyes left clear.

Sneering, John tugged off his gloves and threw them onto the ground. The markings covered him there, as well, the backs of his hands, his palms. Every inch of exposed skin proclaimed him to be the Devil’s possession. If ever there’d been a shred of humanity left in him, it was gone now. With such fertile ground as his covetous ambition, the markings had spread quickly.

“Oh, John,” Bram said, mournful. “You poor bastard.”

Yet John only laughed again. “I’ll remember your pity, when your throat is beneath my heel.”

“What does all this mean?” Walcote cried.

“It means,” said John with an icy smile, “that you are nothing but a buzzing fly. One I will easily swat.” He lifted his marked hands.

Both Livia and Bram acted instantly. Bram stepped in front of Walcote, taking up a defensive position with his upraised sword. Livia spoke the final words of her shielding spell. Power rose like a current of light as she wielded the defensive magic at the same moment John hurled a bolt of dark power at the stunned Walcote.

John’s spell bounced off the defense Livia had flung up, then slammed into a wall. It punched a hole into the plaster. A killing blow, had it struck its intended target.

Walcote fell to his knees, furiously praying.

Livia would concern herself with this mortal later. She readied another incantation as Bram advanced toward John.

“This is but a skirmish.” John took several steps backward glancing cautiously between Livia and Bram. He muttered the beginnings of an incantation under his breath, then spoke aloud. “The final battle is on the horizon. Nothing will endure. Not you, nor your Roman whore, nor all the traitorous Hellraisers will survive.”

Bram struck. Yet before his sword pierced John’s chest, John vanished in a pall of acrid smoke.

In the stillness that followed, punctuated only by Walcote’s fevered prayer, Livia and Bram stared at each other.

“What devilry?” Walcote exclaimed, ashen-faced.

Sheathing his sword, Bram said, “The greatest devilry. Now get you far from here. Gather your family, your weapons, and go as quickly as you can to your country estate. Do not leave there until I give you explicit permission to do so.”

“Tell me what is happening,” Walcote pleaded. “I cannot understand any of this.”

“It is all very simple,” answered Livia. “Bram and I must stop hell on earth.”

Since turning renegade, Bram had abandoned the luxury that had been his birthright. He’d slept in a crumbling, abandoned house and an empty warehouse, and spent half the day in a decrepit Whitechapel inn. He had eaten the coarse, filling food of the lower orders. His meticulously tailored Parisian clothing had been swapped for his father’s musty castoffs. He’d had neither rest nor comfort. In truth, these past days he had lived more as he’d once done in the Colonies, a hardscrabble existence that pared away superfluity.

It felt more true than anything he had experienced since returning home, years ago.

As he and Livia briskly mounted the steps to his sprawling home, he felt a curious remove, as though stepping into someone else’s life.

The doors opened in welcome, spilling light out onto the street. Dalby, his steward, stood waiting at the top of the stairs, his polite disinterest barely disguising his curiosity. After several nights’ absence, the master had returned.

“Dalby,” said Bram, his arm around Livia’s waist as he guided her into the echoing foyer.

“A bath, my lord?”

“Two baths. And a hot meal for myself and Mrs. Corva. She’ll need fresh clothing, too.”

“None of the modistes will be open at this hour,” Dalby said.

“Then buy a gown from a neighbor. The key to my coffer is in a secret compartment beneath the second drawer in my desk. Lively, now.”

The steward bowed and hurried away—showing only a trace of surprise that his indolent master now spoke like an officer commanding one of his troops.

There would be talk, of course. How could there not? The master of the house had returned, looking like a brigand, talking like a soldier, with a strange woman in a secondhand gown on his arm. Whenever Bram had brought women home, they had been the polished jewels plucked from theater boxes, artfully beguiling, full of laughter.

Livia’s face was solemn as a graveside angel, her mien irreproachably regal despite her shabby clothing. Left alone with Bram in the foyer of his home, she gazed at everything—from the polished floor to the crystals hanging from sconces—assessing and astute.

“A new perspective,” she murmured. “Seeing your home through mortal eyes.”

“It seemed smaller to me when I came back from the Colonies.”

She gave him a distracted nod, her gaze still in motion.

Restlessness gnawed at him. He wanted to run training drills, review strategies. Yet he knew they both needed refortification before the coming battle.

He offered her his arm. “Let us go up.”

It startled him, how the light pressure of her fingers on his arm could make his heart beat faster. He ought to be sated, ought to be inured to her touch—especially after the hours they had spent making love this very day. Yet it was as if those hours had never happened. He still burned for her, craved her.

They ascended the stairs together in silence. Here again was a new experience. He’d never brought a woman home with the intent to have her stay.

His home boasted several bedrooms, all of them ready to receive guests. Instead, he led her into his private chambers. An industrious, fast-moving servant had already lit the fire to dispel the chill.

She sank down into a wing-backed chair drawn beside the fire, her gaze lingering on the flames. Though he knew she was weary, she did not lean back or slump in the chair. Her back remained straight, her hands folded elegantly in her lap.

He wanted to stare at her, to see her bathed in the fire’s glow as she sat in his bedchamber. Trace the noble line of her profile, her unmistakably Roman features, and read the thoughts behind her dark eyes.

Instead, he pulled out fresh garments from the clothes press. Everywhere he moved, he saw the familiar furnishings with an outsider’s gaze. For all the sumptuousness of this room—the bed’s silk canopy, the warm smell of beeswax candles, the rosewood writing desk—it was cold.

Or it had been. Turning back to Livia, he revised his opinion. She warmed it by her presence alone.

“You’d prefer the field of battle.” She continued to stare at the fire.

“It’s looming,” he answered. “Yet we wait here for baths and roast partridge.”

“We’re filthy and hungry.”

“And idle. I cannot like it.” He paced to the windows and stared out at the night. The stars burned like ice.

Her gown rustled as she stood and crossed to him. They both watched the evening sky, their bodies close, but not touching.

“See there?” She pointed at the sickle moon, rising above the rooftops. “How it gleams red?”

Indeed, as the moon climbed higher, he did mark the color—a febrile crimson staining its surface.

“John opens the gate between the Underworld and this realm,” she said. “He hasn’t enough power to open it completely, not yet. Had he killed his enemy, that man Walcote, his power would have grown. He could have forced the gate sooner. By thwarting him, we’ve bought ourselves a small measure of time. Not much time, though. He’ll find other means of gaining power, and when he has the gate wide enough, he will summon his army of demons.”

Bram swore, swinging away from the window. “Sod the baths and the food. We have to stop him.”

“Confronting him now would surely be our doom.” She tapped her fingers against the glass.

“You’re damned serene,” he growled, “considering that a demonic army is whetting their swords as we speak.”

Livia’s eyes blazed, and she whirled away. “Serene? How very mistaken you are. It’s taking my very last measure of control to keep from tearing this chamber apart.”

He did not feel assuaged. He was edge and temper and a furious, hungry energy. And all the while, a voice at the back of his mind dripped its acid whisper. It isn’t enough. Nothing you do will stop the coming doom. Even if she wanted your protection, you cannot keep her safe.

It was better when he cared for nothing and no one.

A scratch sounded at the door, and at his command, servants came trooping in. They carried a bathing tub and pitchers of steaming water. Bram directed them to place the tub by the fire, and fill both it and the tub in the closet adjoining the chamber. A footman and a maid also set trays of food upon a table. The room filled with the scents of sandalwood soap and roast meat.

“Very domestic,” Livia noted once the servants departed.

“Strange—that’s certain.” Bram stepped forward and helped remove her gown. He turned her around once the dress slipped to the ground, loosening the laces of her stays. Yet he was already at the door to the closet by the time she wriggled free of her remaining clothing.

He needed her too much. The sight of her nude body would push him past the limits of his discipline.

The scalding bathwater came as a welcome distraction, and he washed himself roughly, scrubbing at his skin as though he could wash off this new self. Too much was at stake. He could ill afford to allow himself to truly feel when he had so much to lose. Yet it could not be undone. For all her hauteur, her commanding ways and pride, the Roman sorceress had stripped him bare and bleeding.

He had died for her. Would do so again. The loss of his own life was nothing. But if the Devil’s threats came to pass, if he were to see her struck down—there would be no recovering. Even in death he would carry that loss with him, and the memory of her pain. And that would be his true agony.

Stepping from the tub, he dried himself and dressed in a shirt, breeches, and boots. When he returned to the bedchamber, he found her with her hair curling damply down her back, clothed in a slightly faded cotton robe à la française. Dalby must have found a neighbor willing to part with some garments for ample compensation.

His breath caught. Mine, he thought, gazing at her as she contemplated the trays of food. This possessiveness came from nowhere and had no precedent. Yet he wanted her to be his, in every way. Just as he wanted to be hers.

A fine time for revelations. At the very moment when I could lose everything.

“My first bath in a thousand years,” she said as he approached. “I nearly wept.”

He bent close to her and inhaled. “Laurel oil and sandalwood. An Aleppo soap I’ve specially made for me.” And now she carried his scent—the most primal marking. Yet beneath was the warm spice of her own fragrance, combining with his to create something wholly new, the joining of them together.

“There was a bay laurel grove at my family’s summer estate in Tusculum.” Her gaze held his. “It was always a relief to escape the heat of the day and lie in the shade, listen to the leaves whisper their secrets.”

“And what did they tell you?”

“That the world was far larger than I could imagine. That there was power beyond my sight.” Memories flickered behind her eyes, people and places Bram would never know, and he found himself greedy for even these pieces of her. “I stopped traveling to Tusculum once I became a votary, but I’d think of those laurel trees whenever the summer heat lay heavy in the temple.”

“We’ve a country estate in Sussex, my family. There’s a forest on the estate—hazel trees, alder and silver birch—but I wasn’t much for laying in the shade.”

“Too busy running wild.” She smiled.

Though spoke lightly, tension glinted like a buried sword beneath their words, and a sure knowledge that evil gathered and strengthened with every passing moment. She kept glancing at the moon, monitoring it.

They helped themselves to the excellent food—he took some gratification in that, to provide her at last with meals worth eating—and dined in silence. Officers did this, dining well in the hours leading up to the first shots of battle, as though determined to wring experience out of life right up to the end.

After their supper had been consumed, the trays and tub removed by the servants. They sat at the edge of the bed, expectant, silent.

He thought, the moment he had her truly in his bedchamber, he would be on her in a moment. Every part of him hungered for her.

Yet he did nothing more than take her hand, her fingers weaving with his.

“Love is a sickness,” she whispered. “It robs you of your strength, hollows you out.”

“Yes.” He laughed once, bleak and wry. “And here I thought I was immune.”

As Livia slept, laying atop the blankets, Bram went down to the music room and selected his tomahawk and favorite sword. He returned to his chamber and sat by the fire, sharpening the blades of both, all the while aware of the moon turning red. He considered his sword in the flickering firelight. All the battles he’d fought in the Colonies were nothing compared to what awaited him and his weapons now, his reasons for fighting so much greater.

Soft footsteps in the hallway alerted him. He leapt to his feet and pulled open the door.

A footman stood there, hand upraised as if about to knock. The servant’s clothing was rumpled. He must have been roused from sleep, and he blinked at Bram—and his unsheathed sword.

“What is it?” Bram demanded.

The servant lowered his hand. “Forgive me, my lord. There are a number of people below. I said they should return on the morrow, but they were most insistent. Lord Whitney, Mr. Bailey, and two ladies. Well, one is a lady. The other is . . .” He coughed, embarrassed. “A Gypsy.”

“Put them in my practice room, and tell them I’ll be down presently.”

Clearly, the servant had not expected this response. He stared at Bram in confusion.

“Go!” And with that, Bram closed the door.

He turned to find Livia awake and already out of bed. In the half light, in her pale gown and with her expression so grave, he nearly mistook her for a spirit once more.

“They’ve come,” he said.

She nodded, grim. “It begins.”

A thought scraped at the back of his mind. Once they set foot outside of his bedchamber, their time alone would be at an end. The tempest would grab hold of them. No stopping until the storm burned itself out, at which point, they would either remain standing or be razed like trees.

They met each other in the middle of the chamber. She stared up at him, full knowledge of what was to come in her night-dark eyes. When he cupped the back of her head, her hands gripped the fabric of his shirt, her fingers digging into the flesh beneath, gaining purchase.

His mouth found hers, her hunger matching his own. They were not gentle or tentative. This might be the end, an awareness that gave their kiss its desperation.

It could not last. The world would not stop in its inexorable rotation. They had to break apart, and so they did, as the fire muttered.

Bram strapped on his sword and tucked the tomahawk into his belt. It had seen considerable use. Soon, its blade would be red—or whatever color demons bled. For all his experience on the battlefield and in the blood-soaked forests of the Colonies, he realized he had no idea what to anticipate in this upcoming confrontation. Such a challenge once excited him.

He glanced over toward Livia, stepping into her slippers. No, he did not fear what lay ahead. He wanted it here, now, and done.

They walked out into the corridor together, putting behind them the idyll of seclusion. Neither he nor Livia faltered in their steps and they went down the stairs, her on his arm. She moved with confidence, as if clad in Caesar’s armor.

He and Livia entered the practice room. The Hellraisers waited for them.

Four pairs of eyes turned to him and Livia as they stepped into the chamber. Even though he had seen Whit a short while ago, it still gave Bram pause to behold his old friend here again in his home. They had spent many a midnight here, carousing or in companionable drink. Yet they were not the same boyhood friends as they had been. They weren’t even the men they had been half a year ago. They—and the world—had irreversibly changed.

Zora hovered close, her gaze chary as she eyed the walls and ceiling as if they might collapse.

Leo stepped from the darker edges of the chamber. Less than a month had passed since last Bram had seen the youngest member of the Hellraisers, but, like Whit, he was profoundly altered. Leo’s gaze had always been incisive, yet now there was a new clarity in his gray eyes, a precision more cutting than the sharpest blade. He was no gentleman of noble or distinguished birth, his vast fortune having been earned through the Exchange, and never did his rougher origins show as they did now. The elegant town fashions he favored had been abandoned for plain, serviceable clothes more suited to a working man. He, too, seemed leaner, tougher—a brawler rather than a man of business.

Bram barely recognized the woman beside Leo. It took him a moment to realize she was Anne, Leo’s wife. The first time Bram met her had been on her wedding day. She had been a slight creature, possessing a quiet prettiness that she had buried beneath reticence. At the time of her marriage to Leo, Bram had wondered what, besides her aristocratic lineage, she could bring to the union. To himself, Bram thought such a diffident woman would be a lackluster bed partner.

It seemed that the experience of being married to a Hellraiser had also transformed Anne. No longer did she shyly avoid his gaze or stand meekly to the side of the room. Her shoulders were straight, her expression self-assured, an abundance of maturity in her hazel eyes. This was no genteel girl, but a woman of experience.

Both Anne and Leo Bailey eyed him guardedly. As well they should. They had not seen one another since Edmund’s death.

“The Devil still owns my soul,” Bram said, “but I’m your ally.”

“He has my espousal,” added Whit.

“I’m merely to take your word?” Leo demanded of Whit.

Scowling, Whit said, “We fought side by side not a month past. You trusted my judgment then.”

Leo narrowed his eyes. “Treacherous times make for inconstant allies.”

“I have remained constant,” Livia said before Whit could snap a retort. “You cannot question my integrity, and I swear upon the magic that runs through my veins that Bram is not your enemy. He’s as true as any of you. More.”

All four visitors gaped at Livia. Cautiously, Zora approached Livia, her coin-decked necklaces jingling with each step. She reached out with one ring-adorned hand. When her finger brushed across Livia’s arm, the Gypsy woman cursed softly in Romani.

“But this cannot be so,” she murmured. “A ghost made flesh?”

Eternally the regal empress, Livia tilted up her chin. “You cannot fathom the extent of what is possible.” With a wave of her hand, glowing spheres appeared overhead like stars, bathing the chamber in celestial blue light. Another wave and the spheres combined to form a second, pale sun.

“Fireworks may impress the crowds at Vauxhall.” Leo, as usual, appeared skeptical. “They’ll not be so effective against the Devil.”

“Or John,” Whit noted.

Livia flung out her hand. A sound like thunder shook the chamber as a shaft of light shot from her palm. It slammed into the practice dummy at the far end of the room. Ash drifted to the floor—all that remained of the figure.

Whit, Zora, Leo, and Anne looked back and forth between the destruction and a smirking Livia, their expressions identically shocked.

“Welcome back to London, Hellraisers,” Bram said. “You’re just in time for the end of the world.”